Jokes You Can Use:

I never make the same mistake twice. I make it 5-6 times, just to be sure.

What kind of music do planets like?

Where can you buy chicken broth in bulk?

How do you tell if a vampire is sick?

Depends on his coffin.

What did the turtle tell the police officer after being mugged by snails?

I’m not sure what happened, it all happened so fast.

A man is walking in a graveyard when he hears the Third Symphony played backward. When it’s over, the Second Symphony starts playing, also backward, and then the First. “What’s going on?” he asks a cemetery worker.

Advisory:

Google Doodle Challenge

This year’s contest is open for online and mailed entries until March 2, 2018 at 8:00pm PST.

Middle School Science Minute

Lifelong Kindergarten – Part 2

This is the second in a seven part podcast series on the book, “Lifelong Kindergarten,” written by Mitchel Resnick.

This second podcast focuses in on chapter one in the book, “Creative Learning.” In chapter one, Mitchel asks the central question of the book – “How can we help young people develop as creative thinkers so that they’re prepared for life in this ever-changing world?”

From the Twitterverse:

After responding today to nearly 20 requests for names of schools that “are already doing it,” this may bear repeating. Our approach too often is: “Before doing what strong evidence shows is better for kids, I’d like to talk to others who have already done it just to be sure.”

Strategies:

Read Alouds

Moss believes the strategic use of read alouds can help students achieve many of the goals of the standards, but she cautions: “Don’t wreck the read aloud with too many instructional interruptions.” Keep it simple and fun.

She’s found that starting class with a read aloud, followed by 10 minutes to write in journals, provides a predictable structure that helps kids settle into the day’s lesson. Having a set process also prevents the read aloud from getting scrapped because of time constraints.

…wanted to give their students, a large portion of whom are ELLs, more tools to discuss the high-level ideas within the texts they were reading. The questions and cues teachers had been using during the read aloud, however, focused students on literal comprehension, which, in turn, reinforced low expectations for student thinking. It also drained the life out of the read aloud. “What’s the conversation in a good book club? Rarely is it recounting what happened in the book,” says Friedman.

Econ Low Down

“Peter Cove has the standard background for a social justice warrior—grew up in Massachusetts, B.A. in sociology from Northeastern University, graduate work at the University of Wisconsin, New York City government jobs, Community Action Agency in Boston, Manpower Assistance Project consultant, New World Foundation program officer. After holding key posts in New York City municipal government, he worked for the Community Action Agency in Boston, where he developed grassroots health, housing, and education programs.

He did his share of the spending of $20 trillion on poverty programs since 1964, but at some point he recognized a pattern: “I saw with my own eyes the value of work—any kind of paid work—in reducing welfare dependency and attacking poverty. I learned that if we helped welfare clients get jobs, even entry-level jobs, they would then attend to their other needs. … Work demonstrates that behavior has consequences. And it allows people to feel the pride and self-respect that come with supporting their spouses and children.”

Poor No More has many specific examples of how real change occurs. Here’s one: “When some mothers on welfare came to us, they often explained that they could not work because they had no day care. We would still send them on a job interview, and when the company wanted to hire them, miraculously, they found a grandmother or daycare center. Childcare wasn’t ultimately the problem— it was their insecurity about being worth anything in the private marketplace. Once they were offered a job, all the barriers to work fell away. By contrast, if the government continued giving them money and other benefits, they were likely to remain dependent.”

Click the Play button below to listen to the show!

Jokes You Can Use:

I got hit in the head with a can of Diet Coke today. Don’t worry, I’m not hurt.

It was a soft drink.

Why do melons have weddings?

They cantaloupe

Do I enjoy making courthouse puns?

Guilty.

Hostess: ‘Do you have reservations?’

Me: ‘No. I’m confident I want to eat here.’

Why did the man name his dogs Rolex and Timex?

Because they were watch dogs

I want to go on record that I support farming. As a matter of fact, you could call me:

Hear about the statistician who drowned crossing a river?

It was three feet deep on average.

Did you hear about the mathematician who’s afraid of negative numbers?

He will stop at nothing to avoid them.

I put my root beer in a square glass. Now it’s just beer.

Why should the number 288 never be mentioned?

It’s two gross.

What do you call a number that can’t keep still?

A roamin’ numeral.

How do mathematicians scold their children?

“If I’ve told you n times, I’ve told you n+1 times…”

The problem with math puns is that calculus jokes are all derivative, trigonometry jokes are too graphic, algebra jokes are usually formulaic, and arithmetic jokes are pretty basic. But I guess the occasional statistics joke is an outlier.

Middle School Science Minute

Lifelong Kindergarten Part 1

This is the first in a seven part podcast series on the book, “Lifelong Kindergarten,” written by Mitchel Resnick. This first podcast focuses in on the purpose of the book and the author himself. Mitchel believes that by providing young people with opportunities to work on projects, based on their passions, in collaboration with peers, in a playful spirit, we can help them prepare for a world that requires creative thinking more than ever before.

Principal Bucket List

Metacognition: How Thinking About Thinking Can Help Kids

Sketchnoting 101, for those with little artistic talent

After having done various forms of sketchnoting for almost a year now, I have some lessons and ideas I want to share with you. But beforehand, we have to take care of the elephant in the room. (And if you don’t want to deal with that elephant, you can find my list of lessons and ideas below it.)

Here’s the beauty about sketchnotes: You don’t need to be an artist to create effective sketchnotes. Using visuals to record ideas are better at producing memories that you can recall than just words.

Getting respect for teachers in schools – well, it’s complicated

It is a bit of a chicken and egg scenario, or is it that simple? Should teachers automatically be respected once they walk in a classroom, or is the respect that students develop for teachers something that is developed over time?

What may be regarded as disrespectful behavior by students is very much subjective and attitudes have also changed over time. That said, we do have to respond to disrespectful behavior in schools and do our utmost to cultivate positive learning environments.

Making Student Feedback Work

The benefits of student feedback are deep and wide — but not always recognized.

Students have a comprehensive view of how their teachers educate and motivate. Student evaluations can be collected cheaply, quickly, and regularly, giving teachers the opportunities to make real-time adjustments to their teaching. Teachers may actually learn about their students from feedback questionnaires, too — how they learn, whom they know well in the class, and with whom they work best.

Middle School Science Minute

Did You Feel It?

I was recently reading the December, 2017 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.

In this issue, I read the the Citizen Science article, “Did You Feel It: Shake Up Your Earth Science Classroom with Earthquake Citizen Science,” written by Jill Nugent. The article describes the free online project to track earthquake charts globally. For more information, please visit:

From the Twitterverse:

The ingredients we need in the recipe 2 create an outstanding middle school are evident. Must have the most committed, passionate, knowledgeable cooks in the kitchen and support them as they work, experiment, and innovate 4 change!@AMLE#mschat@WCSms4U

Resources:

A huge misconception amongst adults, according to Robinson, is that kids don’t like to learn. On the contrary, “my conviction is that kids love to learn. That’s not the problem,” he shared. Rather, “it’s the construct of school” that beats a love to learn out of students, he says.

It’s a time of revolution in many industries across the world.“I mean that literally. There are changes on the planet now that are without precedent,” he said. “We have an exponential rate of technological change, over the past 30 years in particular. We’re heading into a period of even more radical technological innovation, and with it will go entire industries.”

If populations are to meet this revolution, we have to think differently, particularly about the individual self.“We have to reframe the abilities of our children. We have deep natural talents, but we have to discover them and cultivate them. If you have a narrow view of ability, you generate an enormous about of inability.”

Thus, we have to rethink how we do school.“There are systems we’ve created for efficiency, not to get people to learn things,” Robinson started, later adding, “We organize our kids’ learning by their date of birth. We don’t do that anywhere else, except school.”

Maybe There IS Some Value in Graphic Novels?

One of the most spirited conversations in Radical history started with a simple argument: Graphic novels — which were the hot new genre back in 2011 — don’t require students to think as rigorously as more traditional forms of text.

Manga:

K-Pop:

Web Spotlight:

When Will We Get Serious about Teacher Stress?

Of late, I’ve become acutely aware of one sad commonality among these very good people. Teachers are stressed. One could argue teachers have always been stressed but I’m sensing something new and disturbing.

I was recently reading the December, 2017 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.

In this issue, I read the the Editor’s Desk article, “No Glue Required,”” written by Patty McGinnis the Editor of Science Scope. In her article, she discusses modeling. Modeling is used to describe, test, and predict phenomena. She talks about the plant and animal cell models, that she used to have her students make, and how that does not meet the meaning of modeling, as we use it today.

The Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment (GLOBE) Program is an international science and education program that provides students and the public worldwide with the opportunity to participate in data collection and the scientific process, and contribute meaningfully to our understanding of the Earth system and global environment. Announced by the U.S. Government on Earth Day in 1994, GLOBE launched its worldwide implementation in 1995.

Vision: A worldwide community of students, teachers, scientists, and citizens working together to better understand, sustain, and improve Earth’s environment at local, regional, and global scales.

Mission: To promote the teaching and learning of science, enhance environmental literacy and stewardship, and promote scientific discovery.

From the Twitterverse:

Emotional Intelligence will become one of the greatest skillsets we need to thrive in the#futureofwork – EQ is greater than IQ.@garyvee talks about this nonstop! We need to develop self awareness, empathy & social skills that DRIVE our motivation.#edtech#edchat#education

Course Hero

Web Spotlight:

Little Alchemy 2

Discover connections between objects as you build over 600 items by combining objects. It’s not so much about understanding science as it is asking students the question, “Why do you think they associated these two objects together? What do you think was their reasoning and would you have done it differently?”

Need Proof that Your Homework isn’t Fair?

I had an interesting conversation this week with a buddy of mine. Both of us joked about being “single parents” for a few days — meaning we were completely in charge of our kids and our households while our partners were doing other things.

Middle School Science Minute

STEM Club

I was recently reading the November, 2017 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.

In this issue, I read the the article, “How to Start a STEM Club.” It was written by Margaret R. Blanchard, Kylie S. Hoyle and Kristie S. Gutierrez. In the article, the authors presented an eight-step plan for starting an after school STEM Club.

Active engagement often includes collaboration & joy because of the passion around the work. This is how I’ve seen it “rub off” from engaged educator to educator- they are excited to share their work!#EduGladiators

Study finds reading information aloud to yourself improves memory

You are more likely to remember something if you read it out loud, a study from the University of Waterloo has found.

A recent Waterloo study found that speaking text aloud helps to get words into long-term memory. Dubbed the “production effect,” the study determined that it is the dual action of speaking and hearing oneself that has the most beneficial impact on memory.

The study tested four methods for learning written information, including reading silently, hearing someone else read, listening to a recording of oneself reading, and reading aloud in real time.

11 Comic Creation Web Tools and Apps

Resources:

Brain Scans Reveal Why Rewards and Punishments Don’t Seem to Work on Teenagers

One aspect of risk behavior in adolescents appears to be an apparent inability to match their behavior to the likely rewards (or punishments) that might follow.

Parents and teachers are painfully aware that it’s nearly impossible to get a teenager to focus on what you think is important. Even offering them a bribe or issuing a stern warning will typically fail. There may be many reasons for that, including the teenager’s developing sense of independence and social pressure from friends.

Adolescence is defined as the period of life that starts with the biological changes of puberty and ends when the individual attains a stable, independent role in society. (This definition may leave some readers wistfully pondering the second half of that equation). We now know that it is also a time of tremendous brain reorganisation, which we are only just beginning to understand.

Effectively, this study demonstrates the emerging efficiency of a “cool” cognitive control system moderating a “hot” motivational assessment system, resulting in the appropriate balance between the rewards offered and the actions required to maximise performance.

Just increasing any reward/bribe you might be tempted to offer to get a teenager to do something may not have the desired effect.

Instead, try to give young adolescents as much information as possible about an upcoming decision—this could help redress the imbalance between cognition and motivation.

Unsolved

Only a fraction of unsolved problems are suitable for the school classroom, however there still are a huge number to choose from. The purpose of this conference was to gather mathematicians and educators together to select one unsolved problem for each grade K-12. Here is a pdf summarizing the winning unsolved problems. Here are the criteria used to make our decisions:

So, here’s an idea from left field. Show a clip from Istorijos Detektyvai as an example of how other cultures view social studies/history. You can get whole shows from LRT’s webpage, everything from cooking to soap operas. It’s an interesting cultural swim exploring the food shows and what Lithuanians find fun to eat, to designing a living space shows, and what they find newsworthy in their programming. If you find the subtitles button, let me know. Seriously. Let me know.

Middle School Science Minute

Conservation Actions

I was recently reading the November, 2017 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.

In this issue, I read the the article, “Inquiry Into Action: Ecosystems and Animals.” It was written by Megan Ennes, Dennis Kubasko, and M. Gail Jones. It is important that students are presented with opportunities to have a positive impact on our planet and its organisms. As human populations continue to expand, we will continue to see adverse human impacts on ecosystems and their inhabitants. By connecting curriculum to current issues in conservation, students find greater relevance in the topics and are encouraged and empowered to help preserve our planet.

7 Ways to Calm Young Brain Trauma

I’ve Got Research. Yes, I Do. I’ve Got Research. How About You?

In 1847, Hungarian doctor, Ignaz Semmelweis made a remarkable discovery. When doctors washed their hands in a solution of chlorine and water, childbirth fever rates at Vienna General Hospital dropped from 18% to near zero. Offended that Semmelweis implied doctors were killing their own patients, the medical community rejected hand washing as an infection prevention measure, and drove Semmelweis out of medicine and into an insane asylum.

The National Reading Panel Report caused as much damage to reading instruction practices as the standardized testing movement and set independent reading initiatives in schools back decades.

The Power of Being Seen

When the bell rang for early dismissal on a recent afternoon at Cold Springs Middle School in Nevada, students sprinted toward the buses while teachers filed into the library, where posters filled with the names of every child in the 980-student school covered the walls.

Taking seats where they could, the teachers turned their attention to Principal Roberta Duvall, who asked her staff to go through the rosters with colored markers and make check marks under columns labeled “Name/Face,” “Something Personal,” “Personal/Family Story,” and “Academic Standing,” to note whether they knew the child just by name or something more—their grades, their family’s story, their hobbies.

What Teachers Must Consider When Moving to Flexible Seating

Flexible seating in classrooms has become popular over the past few years as educators try to make school feel like a welcoming place with different kinds of spaces for different types of learning.

When thinking about moving to a flexible classroom design, the most important person to consult with may be the custodian. Getting buy-in from administrators is important, but the janitorial staff will be directly impacted by these physical changes, so making sure they are on board is both respectful and crucial to the project’s success. They also might know about unused furniture in storage that could be repurposed inexpensively.

Resources:

Teenage brains can’t tell what’s important and what isn’t

Teenagers may know full well how important final exams are – but that won’t stop some putting in minimal effort. This may be because their brains aren’t developed enough to properly assess how high the stakes are, and adapt their behaviour accordingly.

A region called the corticostriatal network seemed to be particularly important. This is known to connect areas involved in reward to those that control behaviour, and continues to develop until we are at least 25 years old.

Parting is such sweet sorrow. . . and after 24 years of giving birth to Gourmet Curriculum Press, Inc., DBA Gourmet Learning, nurturing it through its infancy and formative

years, and watching it grow into a truly Gourmet meal, the time has come close the company doors and bid farewell to the thousands of inspiring educators that I have had the honor of working with through Gourmet Learning. Teachers, educators and administrators, you are the backbone and inspiration of every child who has passed through your classrooms and hallways. You have positively impacted more lives than you will ever know. And through Gourmet Learning I have had the privilege of watching you pour out your hearts and souls for the children you teach.

The teaching profession is a calling and a mission and as educators you have given 200% to your students, and significantly impacted the future of our world. As I close the doors on Gourmet Learning I want to thank you all for your dedication to the teaching profession and for trusting Gourmet Appetizers, Main Dishes, Desserts and Doggie Bags to help you with your monumental task of educating children. As Mahatma Ghandi said, “Be the change that you

wish to see in the world.”

Blessings to all of you as you continue onward, and thank you for your 24 years of continued support, trust and friendship.

Jan Garber

President, Gourmet Learning

Music Resources

Whether you’re into Afrobeat, experimental music, or spoken language, these three resources let you peruse a seemingly limitless collection of audio treasures from around the world.

Web Spotlight:

Who Is Distracted by a Girl Wearing Skintight Leggings?

Last week, two 5th-grade girls addressed the Atlanta school board, asking that the board change the dress code so that girls might be allowed to wear skintight leggings, which are currently prohibited unless girls are wearing a skirt or shorts over the leggings. The board will announce its decision in January.

We actually have quite a bit of research now on what happens when a girl or woman wears skintight leggings or a swimsuit. Often what happens is “self-objectification”: the girl, or woman, assesses herself as an object on display for others. And the more public the setting, the more likely self-objectification is to occur.

Self-objectification is distracting. It’s hard to concentrate on Spanish grammar when you’re wondering whether this outfit makes your thighs look fat. Girls who self-objectify are also more likely to become depressed. They are less likely to be satisfied with their body. They are more likely to engage in self-harm.

Laptops Are Great. But Not During a Lecture or a Meeting.

In a series of experiments at Princeton University and the University of California, Los Angeles, students were randomly assigned either laptops or pen and paper for note-taking at a lecture. Those who had used laptops had substantially worse understanding of the lecture, as measured by a standardized test, than those who did not.

Parking in a Handicap Spot

The ByStander Effect

We’d all like to consider ourselves helpful people, but are we always quick to lend a hand whenever the opportunity arises? In this episode of The Science of Empathy, we tested, through various scenarios, just how long it would take for people to offer assistance to someone struggling right in front of them.

Middle School Science Minute

Learning Cycles

I was recently reading the November, 2017 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.

In this issue, I read the the article, “Teaching with Learning Cycles and Storylines.” It was written by Susan German. Learning cycles are the blueprint to student learning. Thoughtful consideration of instructional models such as the 5E can guide teachers in structuring learning cycles in such a way as to optimize learning.

Strategies:

Computer Programming

Resources:

Project Gutenberg offers over 54,000 free eBooks: Choose among free epub books, free kindle books, download them or read them online. You will find the world’s great literature here, especially older works for which copyright has expired. We digitized and diligently proofread them with the help of thousands of volunteers.

No fee or registration is required, but if you find Project Gutenberg useful, we kindly ask you todonate a small amount so we can digitize more books, maintain our online presence, and improve Project Gutenberg programs and offerings.

Lithuania Teachers Language Association

To bring language policy makers, language teaching professionals and researchers together for a discussion about the mission of teaching in 21st century, the meaning of teaching quality, efficiency and effectiveness, as well as analyse the aims, needs and perspectives of teaching /learning languages in multicultural environment that could consequently enhance the promotion of democratic citizenship, social cohesion, and intercultural dialogue.

To exchange information and knowledge, share best practices and experiences across national boundaries on teacher training and the enhancement of the development of teachers’ competences that would serve to acquire a better understanding of teaching the New Generation of students.

To disseminate best practices and experiences of Lithuanian teachers as well as of language teaching professionals from abroad in language teaching at all levels in all stages of life.

Class Hook

Web Spotlight:

Second Life

The Digital Ruins of a Forgotten Future

Second Life was supposed to be the future of the internet, but then Facebook came along. Yet many people still spend hours each day inhabiting this virtual realm. Their stories—and the world they’ve built—illuminate the promise and limitations of online life.

Random Thoughts . . .

Moodle Minute

For my Economics class, I run an Acquire Tournament to help them learn financial literacy. Last Thursday I add some reality to the rules. I introduced . . . TAXES. Here’s what they think about taxes:

Mr. McGirr has decided to include taxes. This is fair or unfair because . . . .

You must post one answer and respond to two other people. #PayUp!

“This is not fair because people who are working hard for there money are getting taxed for no reason, but the people who just sit there and are lazy just go get money handed to them.It’s just like a BIG SLAPIN THE FACE for the people who are working very hard for there [sic] $$.Mr. McGirr I thought we were friends. 🙁 🙁 “ #taxationwithoutrepresentation

“Its not Fiar [sic] we need money for our grade so bac players are getting better grades and the higher people get lower grades.”

“I [sic] feel it fair to a point then it becomes to much. I do agree with the president in this topic maybe if the tax is lowered to 22% it would be better for both sides. We get less money taken from us an they still get money.”

“This is unfair because people make choices on what to do with their money and for people who made theright decisions and used their money wisely and got a good job get payed good but for people that are lazy and don’t use their money wisely end up with no money. The goverment [sic] should be able to make money not take money. And people should learn that money cost money”

“I think this is unfair because everyone is getting taxed differently. It would be more fair if everyone was taxed the same amount. I’m not necessarily against the taxes themselves, otherwise how would the government be able to pay for roads and such? I just disagree with the fact that half the class gets taxed less than the first half.”

Brands

Middle School Science Minute

eMammal Project

I was recently reading the November, 2017 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.

In this issue, I read the the Citizen Science article, “Where the Wildlife Are: See Wildlife and Do Science with eMammal,” written by Jill Nugent. The article describes the free online citizen science platform that actively engages students in the study of mammals. For more information, please visit:

From the Twitterverse:

A6: As long as everyone you follow is contributing to your educational growth then I do not think you can have a PLN that is to [sic] big. Why limit your learning when there is so many great educators to follow and learn from#NT2t

Strategies:

Graphic Organizers

According to Allan Paivio’s theory of dual coding, humans process information in both visual and verbal form. When we see the word “book,” we picture a book in our minds, because we’ve had plenty of real-life experiences with books. When we’re learning new words or concepts, it’s helpful to try to form mental images for those ideas to reinforce their meanings.

Resources:

Medal of Honor Foundation

The Foundation

The Congressional Medal of Honor Foundation was founded by the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, which consists exclusively of the living Recipients of the Medal of Honor. The Foundation is dedicated to educating and inspiring Americans about the values embodied in the Medal of Honor: courage and sacrifice, commitment and integrity, citizenship and patriotism.

Buck Institute for Education

Moodle

CBM

Web Spotlight:

STEMIE

This STEMIE Coalition-fueled National Invention Convention and Entrepreneurship (NICEE) event is an annual celebration of K-12 inventors and entrepreneurs from across the U.S. This far-reaching forum is the marquee event of The STEMIE Coalition. The event provides a live, in-person opportunity for youth inventors and entrepreneurs in grades 3-12 to display their critical thinking skills through inventing, innovating, and entrepreneurial activities.

“Ya know, there’s big money in kidneys? and this guy’s got two of ’em.”

Everybody stand back! I lost my contact lens!

Could you stop that thing from beating; it’s throwing off my concentration.

What’s this doing here?

I hate it when they’re missing stuff in here.

That’s cool. Now can you make his leg twitch by pressing that one?!

Well folks, this will be an experiment for all of us.

Sterile schmerile. The floor’s clean, right?

OK, now take a picture from this angle. This is truly a freak of nature.

This patient has already had some kids, am I correct?

Nurse, did this patient sign an organ donation card?

Don’t worry. I think it is sharp enough.

What do you mean “You want a divorce?!?”

FIRE! FIRE! Everyone get out!

Oh no! Page 47 of the manual is missing!

Just before Christmas, an honest politician, a generous lawyer and Santa Claus were riding in the elevator of a very posh hotel.Just before the doors opened they all noticed a $20 bill lying on the floor. Which one picked it up?– Santa Claus, the others clearly don’t exist.

The best way to make somebody remember you is to borrow money from them.

I never make the same mistake twice. I make it 5-6 times, just to be sure.

Middle School Science Minute

Informal Learning

I was recently reading the November, 2017 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.

In this issue, I read the the Editor’s Desk article, “Sparking the “Need to Know,”” written by Patty McGinnis the Editor of Science Scope. In her article, she discusses how educators can use the power of “need to know” learning in our classrooms.

Strategies:

Goose Chase

Carol Dweck Revisits the ‘Growth Mindset’

For many years, I secretly worked on my research. I say “secretly” because, once upon a time, researchers simply published their research in professional journals—and there it stayed.

So a few years back, I published my book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success to share these discoveries with educators. And many educators have applied the mindset principles in spectacular ways with tremendously gratifying results.

A growth mindset isn’t just about effort.Perhaps the most common misconception is simply equating the growth mindset with effort. Certainly, effort is key for students’ achievement, but it’s not the only thing. Students need to try new strategies and seek input from others when they’re stuck. They need this repertoire of approaches—not just sheer effort—to learn and improve.

I also fear that the mindset work is sometimes used to justify why some students aren’t learning: “Oh, he has a fixed mindset.” We used to blame the child’s environment or ability.

Let’s look at what happens when teachers, or parents, claim a growth mindset, but don’t follow through. In recent research, Kathy Liu Sun found that there were many math teachers who endorsed a growth mindset and even said the words “growth mindset” in their middle school math classes, but did not follow through in their classroom practices. In these cases, their students tended to endorse more of a fixed mindset about their math ability.

Pixton

Pixton introduces the world to Click-n-Drag Comics™, a revolutionary new patented technology that gives anyone the power to create amazing comics on the web.

From fully posable characters to dynamic panels, props, and speech bubbles, every aspect of a comic can be controlled in an intuitive click-n-drag motion.

Winning over 10 prestigious awards, Pixton Comics was named a “leading Web 2.0 pioneer” and “one of the 20 companies driving innovation and changing the way we use the Internet” by Backbone Magazine / KPMG.

Pixton is the invention of husband-and-wife team Clive & Daina Goodinson, based in Parksville, British Columbia, Canada.

In 1941, fifteen-year-old Lina is preparing for art school, first dates, and all that summer has to offer. But one night, the Soviet secret police barge violently into her home, deporting her along with her mother and younger brother. They are being sent to Siberia. Lina’s father has been separated from the family and sentenced to death in a prison camp. All is lost.

Lina fights for her life, fearless, vowing that if she survives she will honor her family, and the thousands like hers, by documenting their experience in her art and writing. She risks everything to use her art as messages, hoping they will make their way to her father’s prison camp to let him know they are still alive.

It is a long and harrowing journey, and it is only their incredible strength, love, and hope that pull Lina and her family through each day. But will love be enough to keep them alive? Between Shades of Gray is a riveting novel that steals your breath, captures your heart, and reveals the miraculous nature of the human spirit.

Big Huge Labs

Web Spotlight:

On Accelerated Reader and All the Other Computer Programs

“I just took an Accelerated Reader practice quiz on Elephant and Piggie’s There’s a Bird on Your Head. A picture book I have read so many times I think I know it by heart. A picture book series that my 7th graders end up loving too as we perform plays based on them. A picture book series that made me cry when the last book came out and they told us all “Thank you for being a reader.”

STEMIE

This STEMIE Coalition-fueled National Invention Convention and Entrepreneurship (NICEE) event is an annual celebration of K-12 inventors and entrepreneurs from across the U.S. This far-reaching forum is the marquee event of The STEMIE Coalition. The event provides a live, in-person opportunity for youth inventors and entrepreneurs in grades 3-12 to display their critical thinking skills through inventing, innovating, and entrepreneurial activities.

Middle School Science Minute

BE A BAT DETECTIVE

I was recently reading the October, 2017 issue of “Science Scope,” a magazine written for middle school science teachers, published by the National Science Teachers Association.

In this issue, I read the the Citizen Science article, “Be a Bat Detective,” written by Jill Nugent. The article describes the free online citizen science platform that actively engages students in the study of bats. For more information, please visit:

Strategies:

Metacognition training boosts gen chem exam scores

It’s a lesson in scholastic humility: You waltz into an exam, confident that you’ve got a good enough grip on the class material to swing an 80 percent or so, maybe a 90 if some of the questions go your way.

Then you get your results: 60 percent. Your grade and your stomach both sink. What went wrong?

Students, and people in general, can tend to overestimate their own abilities. But University of Utah research shows that students who overcome this tendency score better on final exams.

This Simple Note-Taking Method Will Help You Read More (and remember what you’ve read)

Warren Buffett is undoubtedly considered one of the greatest investors of all times. His empire, Berkshire Hathaway, is worth $355 billion, an increase of 1,826,163 percent since 1964 when Buffett took over.

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A Night at the Garden

In 1939, 20,000 Americans rallied in New York’s Madison Square Garden to celebrate the rise of Nazism – an event largely forgotten from American history. A NIGHT AT THE GARDEN uses striking archival fragments recorded that night to transport modern audiences into this gathering and shine a light on the disturbing fallibility of seemingly decent people.

When Nazis rallied in Manhattan, one working-class Jewish man from Brooklyn took them on

Addressing the world

what3words is a really simple way to talk about location. We have divided the world into a grid of 3m x 3m squares and assigned each one a unique 3 word address. It means anyone can accurately find any location and share it more quickly, easily and with less ambiguity than any other system.

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JFK Assassination Records – 2017 Additional Documents Release

The National Archives is releasing documents previously withheld in accordance with the JFK Assassination Records Collection Act. The vast majority of the Collection (88%) has been open in full and released to the public since the late 1990s. The records at issue are documents previously identified as assassination records, but withheld in full or withheld in part. Learn more

These releases include FBI, CIA, and other agency documents (both formerly withheld in part and formerly withheld in full) identified by the Assassination Records Review Board as assassination records. The releases to date are as follows:

Accessing the Release Files

To view or download a released file, follow the link in the “File Number” column. You can also download the full spreadsheet with metadata about all the documents. The files are sorted by NARA Release Date, with the most recent files appearing first. The previous withholding status (i.e., formerly withheld in part or formerly withheld in full) is identified in the “Formerly Withheld Status” column.